Capello puts trust in Crouch

Fabio Capello will place his trust in Peter Crouch on Wednesday night as England look to take a mighty stride towards next summer's World Cup in South Africa when they face Ukraine at Wembley.

PUBLISHED: PUBLISHED: 15:46, Tue, Mar 31, 2009

Peter Crouch

Injuries suffered in the friendly defeat of Slovakia on Saturday have forced Emile Heskey and Carlton Cole to withdraw over the weekend while their replacement, Darren Bent, did not even get through the warm-up in training before limping out.

"Crouch is the best forward I can put on there," said the England boss.

"He can do the job that Heskey did. But the most important thing will be the movement near him because he cannot play in exactly the same way as Heskey."

Capello's assistant Franco Baldini was quickly on the telephone to Aston Villa number two John Robertson to secure the release of Gabriel Agbonlahor, who has recovered from the hamstring problem that forced him to miss Friday's under-21 game in Norway.

However, given Agbonlahor will not have a single training session with the senior squad, having made his debut in Spain last month, it is to Crouch that Capello must turn against a very dangerous Ukraine outfit.

It also seems Capello's formation, which proved so successful against a Slovakian side that represented an identikit of what Ukraine will offer, is sacrosanct as well.

"I am not going to change the style," he said.

"It will be the same as Slovakia, with (Wayne) Rooney and (Steven) Gerrard in the same positions, because the result was very good.

"During the game it is possible we will make some changes but we have enough options."

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